Interview with Dr. Jay Bickford

The EIU Writes staff has begun a new project. This project will force us to leave the Writing Center's safe confines and venture out from Coleman Hall's maze-like corridors into Panther Country.

Our plan is to interview faculty and staff members from all over Eastern's campus. We will ask them questions about the importance of writing in their field, their own writing, and their teaching of writing. Our goal is to encourage a campus-wide conversation about writing.

The blog's first victim is Dr. Jay Bickford of the School of Education, whom I had the pleasure to interview. Snippets of the conversation are found below.


I've always heard that strong readers make strong writers. What do you like to read? Who are your favorite authors?

Man, I could talk about that all day. As far as my own work goes, I try to read authors that disagree on the same event or historical figure. I try to read all the biographies I can about a historical figure.  

Do you have any personal writing quirks? A certain place to write, time of day, anything like that?

I have all sorts of little quirks. I have to sit so I’m laying way back, almost like I’m in a lawn chair. I try to drink a lot of water so I have to get up and go to the bathroom. I try to get up and take quick breaks. 

What were your best and worst writing experiences?

My worst writing experience was my dissertation. It was very complicated. It started out as a real interest, and then it became a real labor. I burned myself out from it. After I did my dissertation, I did the book, and I was done.

As for my best writing experiences,  I really enjoy stumbling across something that others have not found. It's great to make a significant contribution to the field.

How is writing in the field of education research different from writing in the humanities?

In education you’re looking for precision. You want to be explicit and precise. Also, in education research you want your comments to be empirically grounded.

Do you have any grammatical or syntactical miscues you often make? The kind that you are a little embarrassed to find in your writing?

Writing as an education researcher, all of the writing should be in the active voice. You have to avoid the passive voice, euphemisms, idioms and colloquial expressions. When I edit I find lots of little errors when it comes to subject-verb agreement. But, my biggest mistakes are when I unintentionally choose complexity to impress my readers over clarity to facilitate my readers comprehension. That’s my biggest struggle. 

How important is clarity in writing in your field?

It’s incredibly important and it is very much undervalued. Like in any field, clear writing indicates clear thinking. Something I tell my students all the time is "stupid doesn’t teach." You have to think things through. So if you write something clearly, you show that you have thought it out. 

 

 
 

Mixed up with Metaphors?

President Obama’s 2009 inaugural address was certainly composed by some of the brightest rhetoricians in the country.  But one slip-up in particular…

“As we consider the road that unfolds before us…”

…reminds us that even the best mix their metaphors.  Political speeches make easy pickings when it comes to the harvesting of linguistic sour apples, because metaphorical imagery is frequently used to help a listener visualize the talking point.  Elsewhere in the speech, the president effectively used images of the perseverance of American revolutionaries by relating their militaristic circumstance to our economic circumstance:

"Let it be told to the future world that in the depth of winter, when nothing but home and virtue could survive, that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet it." 

 So where did President Obama stumble?

We recall that metaphors are a form of figurative language that allows us to describe an abstract concept with a dissimilar, often concrete, image.  In the line from the address, two concrete images are intended to describe the abstract concept of the future of our country:

1. Our country’s future is like a road that we will follow.

2. Our country’s future is like a map that is unfolding.

The problem is that metaphors work by creating images in our mind, and the President’s mixed metaphor evokes two dissimilar images.  A road cannot unfold like a map, so what image can we form? 

Don’t worry if the example is just clicking now.  Mixed-metaphors can be tricky, because we get so used to using concrete images (like road or book) that we transform them into abstractions (like journey or story.)  We call these dead metaphors, which is a kind of cliché.  Last week I talked about the cliché impact and how it sneaked into our language.  

Since mixed metaphors are sneaky, I can give a technique for spotting them.  As you read, imagine each subject and verb in its most literal sense.  Doodle the scene if necessary.  If the runner gets to fly down the track (like a bird,) then, for the purposes of that sentence, that is his one and only super power.  He doesn’t also get to shoot past the crowd (like a bullet) or climb through the pack (like a monkey). 

When we find them, how do we fix our mixed metaphors?

There are many solutions, but basically one of the images has to go.  Using President Obama’s speech as an example:

1. As we consider the road  that we must travel...

2. As we consider the map that unfolds before us…

Metaphorical images can make great speeches as well as great papers, but we have to be sure that— in keeping with the law of comic book characters— each subject gets only one super power.

Inspiration & Connection

Clustering Exercise

Clustering is similar to another process called Brainstorming. Clustering is something that you can do on your own, or with friends or classmates to find inspiration in the connection between ideas. The process is similar to free-writing. Jot down ideas on a piece of paper or on the blackboard. Don't allow that ugly self-censor to intrude and say that your idea (or anyone else's) is dumb or useless. Write it down anyway.

In Clustering, you jot down only words or very short phrases.

• After you've generated some ideas, use linking lines as connections suggest themselves.

• Use different colored pens as ideas seem to suggest themselves in groups or subgroups.

• Don't cross anything out because you can't tell where an idea will lead you. When you get a few ideas written down, you can start to group them, using colored circles or whatever.

• One strategy that may also work for you is to suggest ideas that are main thoughts or supportive ideas by using printing or longhand script. This is only an organizational tool. You can also use asterisks, stars, smily faces, high-lighting pens or whatever system appeals to you. So long as you know what it means, the symbols will work to cue you about main ideas and the ones that act as support. 

• Don't bother to organize too neatly, though, because that can impede the flow of great ideas. This is an idea building strategy and not a finished paper.

Figure 1: example of a clustering exercise

Points to Ponder:

Can you draw additional links between concepts?

Are there ideas listed above that you'd reject as irrelevant or too much to deal with?

Can you think of some ideas (or a whole set of ideas) that should have been included but weren't? 

Should they be included in your essay?

Do you think you could write an essay using the ideas clustered from group discussion?

'Twerk' it up

I did not watch the MTV Video Music Awards. In fact, the only part of the VMAs I have witnessed is Miley Cyrus 'twerking' in front of (or on?) Robin Thicke, which I have watched on Youtube countless times. With each viewing, I only become more confused. 

A little lost in the Miley Cyrus noise was this article on The New York Times: "Oxford Dictionary Decides 'to Twerk.'" Several other major news sources also picked up the story, with similar headlines. Of course, this caused countless grammarians, English graduate assistants and people who regularly wear tweed jackets to bemoan the English language's precipitous decline.

However, as Forest Wickman from Slate pointed out, "twerk" is not on its way into the Oxford English Dictionary's hallowed halls. Instead, twerk, along with the word "selfie," is going into the Oxford Dictionary Online, which is a totally different beast. The ODO focuses on modern English usage, while the OED concentrates on the history of the English language. Words are never removed from the OED. The ODO is to the OED as a dog's memory is to Gandalf's.

Although I was pleased to know that in 300 years no one will come across twerk in the OED next to a photo of Miley Cyrus' deranged face (at least for now), I did wonder how words made the cut into the OED. For those interested, here is a video produced by the University of Oxford that explains the process.

This clip lead me to further investigate the OED, which brought me to the book The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester. Although I have only made it partway through the book, I find it both entertaining and informative. For example, did you know that Samuel Johnson's dictionary outsold the Bible for several years? Or that Johnson's dictionary also included profanities? Or that George Orwell (among others) wanted to purge the language of all its Latin-based words and phrases, returning English to its Anglo-Saxon roots and forcing all of us to speak like the characters in Beowulf? 

Most importantly, does anyone else think that twerk has an Anglo-Saxon ring? Would it make it into Orwell's lexicon, I wonder?

Here is the link to the NYT article, and here is the link to the Slate article


 

Impact Epidemic

Impact your world proclaims a CNN member website.  Is their astronomy news associate identifying an interstellar collision?  Is a military affiliate recounting the tremors of war?  Perhaps some hard-hitting football coverage follows the headline?  No, the popular news outlet has misused the verb “impact” to identify their philanthropic branch.  CNN is not alone, though.  The verb has infected term papers and pop songs, lab reports and presidential speeches.

So what do we know about this word that has quietly invaded and conquered our lexicon?

Impact is a verb which describes an instance of forceful contact, but in the specific form that interests us, it is figurative.  This means that it is used to describe something other than, say, a collision of a pumpkin with the street.  The pumpkin literally impacts the ground, whereas a poignant speech figuratively impacts a person (unless, of course, they are seated too near to a slavering orator.)

Sometimes figurative language can add variety or give a new perspective on a well worn image.  The starlight danced across the surface of the pond.  Here “danced” surprises us, because starlight has no body with which to dance, but its reflection shifting from ripple to ripple may resemble the movement.  It has special power to say what the more literal verb, reflected, could not.

However, “impact” has lost that special power.  The impact of “impact” is diminished, because our brains no longer connect its figurative form to its literal form, as in: the grandmother’s love impacted the boy’s life the way a meteor impacts and redirects another.  Instead, “impact” has been worn out by overuse, and we only perceive that the grandmother’s love vaguely changed the boy. 

So how do we know when to use impact and when to toss it out?

Here is an easy check:

Are you describing a boxing match?

A meteor shower?

A car crash?

Sammy Sosa?

No?  Then it may be a good idea to replace those “impacts.”  Fowler’s Modern English Usage condemns figurative use of the verb, because it has become technical jargon.  Remember, a physical collision is an impact, but for anything else there is probably a better word.

But what is that better word?

What probably fits best is either the verb “affect” or the noun “effect.”  That pair is the true one-size-fits-all.  If you go cross-eyed over a and e, there is still hope.  There are many more words at your disposal that will do just as well.  Instead try, change, sway, touch, influence, or move.

For the science majors— whose grumbles I can already hear rising from the verb-shaped voids in your lab reports— I will beat you to the question:

“Why do I have to worry about the “English details?”  All the data, charts, and graphs give me enough trouble.”

I answer by sharing an instance in which English and the use of “impact” is a big deal:

Previous crash test results were disastrous, but recently the airbag made a big impact on the dummy.

Would you ride in that car or not?  Was the test dummy cushioned or crushed?  We see that it is not the poets who have more to lose through careless language.  At worst their poems are banal, while those in scientific fields must be clear or jeopardize the safety of their coworkers and customers.  It is for clarity that the English language has such great variety, and each word we choose affects our audience.

Enthymemes Connect Reasons to Conclusions, and Build Bigger, Better Papers

Enthymemes? What the what?

The American English Dictionary defines an enthymeme as

"an argument in which one premise is not explicitly stated."

In other words: Because A = B, and B = C, then it follows that A also = C.

Even Wikipedia knows all about enthymemes and offers an example:

“Socrates is mortal because he's human.”
 

The complete formal syllogism (or enthymeme) in the classic is as follows:

A. All humans are mortal. (major premise = assumed);

B. Socrates is human. (minor premise = stated);

C. Therefore, Socrates is mortal. (conclusion = stated)

The word enthymeme was used by the Greek philosopher Aristotle when, in his treatise on rhetoric, he needed to describe how reasoning works informally in our everyday arguments where we do not necessarily use the mathematically rigid forms of logic.

In Greek, the term combines en = into, and thymos = soul, to suggest the way that reasoned language is able to produce belief. Aristotle called the enthymeme the “body (or substance) of proof.”

The relationship created between a reason and a conclusion is not self-contained. It makes implicit reference to other ideas that help to bind the reason to the conclusion, making it seem to follow.

Here is an example of enthymemes used in an actual argument, in a brief passage from Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail:

“A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama, which set up the state’s segregation laws, was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?”

Conclusion: Alabama’s segregation laws are unjust.

Reason: Those laws were inflicted on a minority that had no role in enacting them.

Assumption: Any law that is inflicted on a minority that had no role in enacting it is an unjust law.

The reason here is itself the conclusion of another enthymeme:

Conclusion: African Americans had no role in enacting Alabama’s segregation laws.

Reason: African Americans were prevented from voting for the state legislature.

Assumption: Anyone prevented from voting for the legislature has no role in enacting laws passed by that legislature.

In other words: because A = B, and B = C, therefore A = C.

Your thesis statement (disguised as an enthymeme) begins to operate like so:

Because 'A' is true, therefore 'B' and 'C' are also true.

Question: “How do enthymemes help me build bigger, better papers?”

Answer: Enthymemes help to build a bigger, beefier thesis statement that also helps you structure your paper. (For you vegans out there, this is only a metaphor.)
The paper can now be written with the enthymeme in the place of a thesis statement. The next few paragraphs will flow more easily with that bigger, better, more forceful powerhouse (i.e., the enthymeme) on your side.

Remember: Because A = B, and B = C, therefore A = C.



*To pronounce the word, "enthymeme," go here: http://youtu.be/C0tMcoMleZg

On Misplaced Modifiers

On our second day of orientation, the new batch of English graduate assistants working in the writing center[1] this year took the grammar section of the College Level Academic Skills Test (CLAST). The test was brief, 40 questions in all, and self-graded. Taking the test served several functions, not least of which was to quickly check any budding egos. The main reasons were to provide the graduate assistants with a heads up on their own grammatical miscues and to prepare them for forthcoming questions from students.

While many of the questions on the test were discussed, one in particular frustrated me to no end, causing me to think about nothing else for the rest of the orientation, and to continue speaking about the subject over the weekend until my girlfriend threatened to brain me with the nearest blunt object if I didn’t shut up.

The test directions were to “Choose the sentence that expresses the thought most clearly and effectively and that has no errors in structure.” The question focused on misplaced modifiers, and went as follows:

A.      John left the classroom immediately after the last speech.

B.      John immediately left the classroom after the last speech.

C.      Immediately, John left the classroom after the last speech.

The author chose answer “B.” To his great consternation, the correct answer is “A.” While both answers are grammatically sound, the people of CLAST apparently believe that A expresses the thought most clearly and effectively.  In an attempt to decipher the logic behind the answer, the author and other assistants came to the conclusion that A comes closest to how people actually speak. This in itself is a satisfactory answer, except that it touches on a long-standing grammar debate between “prescriptivists” and “descriptivists,” the two camps fighting over the very nature of the English language in a winner-take-all battle.[2].

As a rule of thumb, you want to have the modifier as close as possible to whatever is being modified in order to avoid confusion. The prescriptivist Brian Garner provides some great examples of misplaced modifiers, including ‘“Both died in an apartment Dr. Kevorkian was leasing after inhaling carbon dioxide.”’[3] In this example, the writer means that the people died after inhaling carbon dioxide. However, due to misplaced modifiers, the sentence gives the impression that Dr. Kevorkian leased the apartment after inhaling carbon dioxide. A rewrite that erases the confusion would be “Both died after inhaling carbon dioxide in an apartment Dr. Kevorkian was leasing.” Note that the modifier (inhaling carbon dioxide) is much closer to the verb being modified (died) in the rewrite.

Originally, I thought A was not the best choice because it placed the modifier (immediately) further away from what was being modified (left). It turns out, dear reader, that I was hopelessly incorrect! In A, "immediately" is not modifying "left" at all. Instead, "immediately" is acting as a qualifier for the adverbial preposition "after the last speech." 

There are some interesting differences between qualifiers and modifiers, but that will have to be taken up in another post. However, here is another example of a qualifier (with some hip lingo thrown in): "That kid is wicked smart!" In this example, "wicked" is acting as a qualifier for the adjective "smart." How smart is the kid? The kid is wicked smart. 

Alright, I have one last thing to say about modifiers. Another common mistake is what is referred to as a "squinting" modifier. Take for example the sentence, "The tugboat chugged along noisily blowing its whistle." It is unclear whether the adverb "noisily" refers to the tugboat chugging along or to the tugboat blowing its whistle.

All of that is to say, choosing where to place the sentence’s modifiers carefully avoids confusion.[4]

Author's Note: I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to Dr. Shonk, who provided much needed guidance with this post. He also came up with the tugboat example. 

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[1] Please come visit us. If you don’t, we’ll spend all of our time talking about inane subjects like whether Mark Twain was a briefs or boxers sort of guy. (The author posits boxer-briefs).

[2] I’m stealing this from a great essay by David Foster Wallace titled “Authority and American Usage,” but suffice it to say that a “prescriptivist” would be someone like your middle school grammar teacher who circled every sentence ending with a preposition with a red felt pen in a paper you handed in before drawing frowny-faces in the margins. A “descriptivist,” on the other hand, would be someone like your middle school art teacher who told you that the most important thing in the world was to express your own, special and totally unique soul in whatever way your heart desired.Or, as Dr. Shonk explained, a prescriptivist is someone who explains "how" something should be said, while a descriptivist is someone who explains "what" is actually said.

[3] Garner, Brian. Modern American Usage. 3^rd Edition. 540. Oxford UP, 2009.

[4] See my point?

EIU President Bill Perry: The Power of Words

This part of our video interview with President Bill Perry was first posted here on April 11, 2011.  We offer it to you again as we inaugurate the Fall 2013 semester.